


Moral of the Story

by Debate



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Episode: s04e13 Praimfaya - Time Jump, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Reflection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-13
Packaged: 2019-06-09 22:39:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15277707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Debate/pseuds/Debate
Summary: Madi is getting to an age when Clarke can tell some of her darker stories, even the ones where her own actions chill her bones. Like that time she almost played God.[Taking place during the six year time jump, based on Clarke's drawing as seen in 5.08: How We Get To Peace]





	Moral of the Story

“Clarke?” Madi’s voice whispers into the darkness of night, like she’s checking to see if she’s still awake. 

“What is it Madi?” she says in a normal tone to indicate that Madi hasn’t woken her. It’s late and they should both be sleeping, but it seems too cold right now to sleep comfortably, and besides, the nights are long enough to give them plenty of time to rest fully, if they want to sleep in. 

“How are you a nightblood?” she asks, and it’s clear that it is something she’s been thinking hard about from the way that she sits up in her bed. After dinner Clarke had talked about Luna, how she had rejected the history of the commanders in favor of peace and solitude, and how she had refused to take the flame. Madi had liked her instantly, called her brave for fleeing her Conclave. Clarke hadn’t mentioned the final Conclave of course, or of Luna’s influence there. Doesn’t tell her that Octavia killed her. “Because you never had to fight in a Conclave, and you’re a grown up. And skaikru.” 

Clarke swallows, her mind thrown back into Becca’s lab, a place she hasn’t returned to since Praimfaya despite the useful supplies that are still buried there. Normally she attributes her absence to the ghosts of her friends, who, if they’re not walking among the stars, are certainly still stuck down there. But she also knows that the screams of the Rocklander she killed would reverberate in her ears if she ever returned; as would Murphy’s. 

Madi is getting too smart for her age, she’s never thought to ask that question before. Although she’s older now, maybe it’s a story she’s ready to hear. Or parts of it at least. 

“Well you know how smart my mom is,” Clarke starts, and she can’t see Madi well in the dark, but she can tell that she perks up at the mention of Abby, who Madi loves. “Well, before Praimfaya we were looking for a way to survive, and she discovered that nightblood could protect people from the radiation. Luna showed us that,” she adds, taking a breath. “And my mom figured out a way to replicate it, so that people with red blood could be injected and be protected too.” 

Madi is almost silent, but Clarke can hear the little humming sound she makes when she’s thinking. 

“But it was risky,” Clarke continues, a light way of putting it. “The treatment was dangerous and we didn't know if it would work, the first person who tried it died.” 

“So you volunteered?” Madi asks, and it would be so easy to agree, to paint a picture that makes her the hero of the story. But Madi doesn't need to be protected, at least not from the dark parts of Clarke. Not anymore. 

“Not exactly,” she says, remembering Emori spread out on the counter, not even in a proper hospital bed, Luna lying across from her, a mirror image. “You remember Murphy and Emori?”

“Mh-hm,” Madi hums, “they're in space.” 

“Yes,” Clarke reaffirms, “they're safe in space.” 

There's not much that she's told Madi about the pair. Clarke had hardly known Emori, who had seemed to appear when needed with a boat that could get her mother to the island and closer to a cure, and Clarke had been grateful. She had learned later that Emori had been in Polis during the final confrontation with ALIE, in the tower, although Clarke had been too preoccupied to notice her at the time. On the other hand she had known Murphy well, or well enough. Clarke supposes he is like his girlfriend, appearing in unexpected places. 

Talking about Murphy with Madi is hard though, not in the same way as it’s hard to talk about her parents, who she misses with a stinging sharpness that seems to cut too close when she remembers them, but more likely because of the shadow that lingers in every story she knows about Murphy. There’s no brightness in the story of his hanging, or of Bellamy’s. Nothing hopeful about his presence in Finn’s massacre, or Lexa’s death. Even him keeping her alive is soured by the news of the world’s impending doom. But just because there’s no joy in those stories doesn’t mean there’s nothing for Madi to learn from them, as Clarke learned from them. 

“Well they were both with us when my mom figured it out,” she exhales slowly, “and we were going to test the nightblood on Emori, without her permission.” 

Madi makes a small sound of distress, and Clarke can hear the uneasy shifting of her blankets. “Why?” 

“Emori lied to us, about something important, and that lie got someone hurt,” Clarke says. “At the time everyone was really desperate, and for a moment we thought she deserved it.” 

Clarke remembers Emori, sitting by the rocket, chained to it, her face drawn and resigned. It had been harrowing, when hours before she had met Clarke’s eyes with her teeth bared, fiercer than a panther. 

“But she didn’t,” Clarke says, “and the only person who knew that was Murphy.

“Madi,” Clarke continues, shifting the trajectory of the story, “do you know what _frikdreina_ means?”

“A stain?” Madi says, unsure, but with fear making the end of the second word high. Clarke’s lip twitches at the implication that grounders were so heavy-handed in their prejudice that even young Madi was left with an impression. Although she remembers that Roan had refused to even be in the same room as Emori. 

“That’s what people called Emori,” Clarke explains, “and when she was little, younger than you, her clan cast her out because of it. So she was very lonely, and distrustful, because people didn’t want to be around her.” 

“That’s sad,” Madi says. When she was younger it had been hard for her to understand why her clan members, her parents, and friends had all gone silent. It had taken a village to hide Madi’s nightblood, and she had been loved by a whole community, who had all suddenly died. But she had Clarke now, and she will always be loved. 

“Yes, it is,” Clarke says, “and unfair.

“But after we all came down to the ground, she and Murphy met and they fell in love. So he didn’t want us testing the nightblood on Emori, and he showed me something important. Just because Emori had been brushed aside her whole life didn’t mean that we could continue treating her like she didn’t matter, because she is important to someone, because Murphy loves her. And Madi,” Clarke says, “you have to remember that’s true for everyone. Everyone is loved by somebody, and if they die it breaks someone else’s heart.

“So I injected the nightblood into myself because Emori and Murphy were both worth saving.”

Madi is quiet for a long moment, and Clarke thinks she might sleep now, but of course she has too much energy and too many questions. 

“How’d they meet?” Madi asks, “It’s pretty romantic.” It wasn’t, but she doesn’t think she can convince Madi of that. 

“I don’t know how they met,” she says, wishing it was a story she knew, something tells her it’s a good one. But it’s not like she’d ever had an opportunity to ask Murphy about his romantic life, even if that’s something she’d have wanted to do. Nonetheless she wishes she could tell Madi about a romance that didn't end in death, but she doesn't know how Murphy and Emori met, or how Monty and Harper grew together, or even how her mom and Kane fell in love. 

Madi doesn’t seem too broken up about it, though. “I’ll just ask them when they come down,” she says, a yawn finally creeping into her voice. 

Clarke starts to hum in the way that calms Madi, and her breaths grow deeper. 

“Sleep well, _natblida_ ,” Clarke murmurs, and prepares for sleep herself. 

She’s awoken the next morning by Madi flinging off her blankets. 

“Clarke, it snowed!” she says in excitement, and is out the door before Clarke can remind her that they have chores. She lets it slide, taking her time to get out of bed. They can afford a lazy day. 

There are nuts on the table from dinner last night, and she eats a few before picking up her sketchbook that’s still sitting open on a drawing of Luna that Clarke had rendered for Madi the previous evening. Clarke can’t help but be happy about the way she captured her hair. 

She sits down, her hand going for the radio, as she flips to a blank page. 

“Bellamy,” she starts, as has become habit, “by my count it’s been 849 days since Praimfaya. I hope you’re all doing well. Winter has set in officially, we had our first snow of the season last night. I don’t think it will be as hard as last year, and Madi’s enjoying the snow even if it’s just a dusting.” She pauses and glances over at Madi out the window, who has ran all over in order to collect enough snow to make a tiny snow person. A smile spreads across her face, youthful and carefree, as she adds pebbles for its eyes. “I can’t wait for you all to meet her.” 

It’s a miracle she and Madi found one another. One that almost didn’t happen. She picks up one of her homemade pencils and draws a curved line, the start of a rocket she realizes after a moment.

“Bellamy, if you could, would you apologize to Emori for me?” she says, “For what happened in Becca’s lab. I don’t think I ever apologized for that.” There’s so much that she’s never apologized for, and ever though Emori didn’t die, Clarke shudders thinking about who she would be if she had. “And to Murphy too, I-” She pauses and purses her lips. “Hey, Murphy,” she continues, as she starts to sketch his figure, “hope you’re doing okay, and I mean that sincerely too. I guess I’m missing you today, and I bet you’d have something to say about that, but...I mean it. You’re smarter than I gave you credit for, and not just when it comes to your own survival. Just thought I’d let you know.” 

She puts the radio back into place, her focus falling fully onto the drawing. Murphy’s face begins to take shape, and she’s never been the best at expression, preferring figures. But it doesn’t matter much when she’ll never forget how he looked at her, how he made her look at him. It makes her taste cloves in her mouth now, just thinking about it. 

Drawing Emori is harder, Clarke’s forgotten the swirl of her tattoo and the shape of her eyes, and it makes her sick that she remembers her best when she was lying on that table in the lab. Clarke would like to talk to her more when they get back down, learn about who she is. 

The drawing is chilling when complete. As it’s meant to be, a reminder. 

She closes the notebook, to be looked at another time.

**Author's Note:**

> Listen 5x09 was a shitstorm, but I'm still not over Clarke drawing God Complex fanart, so I wrote some fanfic about it. Also haven't written Clarke before really, so her characterization is a bit of a shot in the dark, tell me what you think!


End file.
